


So That We Might Better Learn To Pick Ourselves Up

by i3ernadette



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-16
Updated: 2010-09-16
Packaged: 2017-10-11 21:38:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/117390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i3ernadette/pseuds/i3ernadette
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why do we fall?</p>
            </blockquote>





	So That We Might Better Learn To Pick Ourselves Up

Faith had fallen. It was unexpected and unremarked, a battle with a demon, a single croaking beast with blades for fingers and fire for breath, and she was speared to the ground by its talons as it whispered flaming vitriol over her face. Willow had watched, silent and sure, from the darkness, before rupturing what passed for the creature's heart with a single gesture.

They buried her in a shallow grave, a blank stone above her head and bloody roses at her feet. Buffy had screamed, Xander had swallowed at the never-ending lump in his throat, the ranks of Slayers had cried, and Willow had smiled.

Two days later, she walked into the tiny flat she shared with Buffy when Dawn was away at University, Faith at her side. The dark slayer was blind, but she moved around the furniture as if she had never needed eyes. When they made their way into the tiny kitchen, Buffy and Giles had nothing to say. Xander had wrapped his arms unquestioningly around his revived beloved and had no words. Willow had smiled.

When the Slayers buried over generations and millennia began to make their way from their tombs, rank and file from the dozen graveyards the Council had tended over the ages, from the bottom of never-ending chasms and demon nests, new Slayers stood ready to take them in hand, lead them to the place where the blind Slayer, the bright Slayer, and the white-eyed Witch waited to guide them.

Willow had spent long years as a hacker, learning the loopholes in codes and the ways around walls. It had been a long time since she had mis-defined a parameter, and her replacement of "Slayer" for "Faith" had been no accident. Willow smiled.


End file.
